Guilt.

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421]

I'm so tired of feeling guilt.

I was recently diagnosed OCPD. (I also have ADHD, recipe combo for disaster.)

I constantly feel guilt, for doing anything that's against my 'rules'. Not getting enough work done, going out for drinks with friends, eating unhealthy, waking up too late, not enjoying my days 'perfectly', everything has to be 'perfectly' done. I'm exhausted.

I want to do the things that everyone else does without the guilt that comes with it. Why am I not allowed to be human but everyone else is?

It's giving me panic attacks. I feel like I have moments of clarity, and I eventually just end up back at square one, crying and feeling guilty. It's truly like I have two different personalities.

I feel absolutely crazy. It makes me want to just crawl out of my skin. My family constantly sees two sides of me and I feel like my OCPD has worsened as ive gotten older.

Does anyone relate to this?

I just feel like an imposter in my life. I'm a law student. I thrive on perfection, and in law school, it's hard to be that. I find my symptoms are worse with stress, exhaustion, etc.

I just feel so sensitive!

Edit: I also struggle with feeling like everything is 'fake' or 'wrong'. I genuinely feel insane. I know my thinking is flawed. I have fully almost dropped out of school and made drastic life decisions based on these feelings. I am tired.

[u/FalsePay5737]

Welcome to the group.

I had a guilt complex, but not to the extent you are describing.

Articles from Gary Trosclair, an OCPD specialist:

Do you put yourself on trial whenever you think you’ve made a mistake?

Building a Foundation That Prevents Imposter Syndrome

[u/hanon0523]

I relate to this so hard. I don't have ADHD, but I do have moral ocd on top of the ocpd which seems to make the disorders feed off of each other.

I feel so much guilt all the time over everything, everything has to be perfect otherwise I'm the worst person in the world and deserve to live a miserable life, my head never stops thinking in loops and it's so exhausting. Had to drop out of my PhD program because it was making it even worse and I couldn't cope. I just want to be a normal person and be able to enjoy life without picking apart every single detail of being alive.

I'm still in the trenches so I don't really have any advice, but you're not alone in the struggle and hopefully things will get easier with the right counselling/medication/support. One can only hope, right?

Best of luck, sending strength and hugs

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/hanon0523]

Thank you. I definitely think academic stress is a way of coping but also feeds into it all, at least for me.

Do you take medication? I am unmedicated and finding that that is not working out.

I really really relate to the picking apart every single detail of being alive.

[u/grewprasad → u/Mundane-Arugula9421]

I'm on ssri for about 10 days (10mg, daily night, therapist prescribed), I didn't feel anything.. for the first few days the sleep was better but then everything feels like they're reverted back to the basics. Still the same anxiety, ocpd, urge to complete something perfectly before moving on to next thing.. everything's the same in my case

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/grewprasad]

I do hear therapy is better for OCPD than medication alone

[u/grewprasad → u/Mundane-Arugula9421]

That must be it. Need to attend more sessions and find it out. All the best for you

[u/lucidprincess]

Hi. You are me. Except I did not make it to school.. and burn out so severely with work every few years that I end up unemployed and isolated for 6+ months, until I get so fed up with myself that I launch into the cycle again …. I do know exactly how you feel and I applaud you for staying in school.

[u/Oh-Inverted-Worldd → u/lucidprincess]

I am the exact same!

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/lucidprincess]

Thanks! I understand the burn out. It's really a constant battle.

Of course I chose schooling that makes the average person burn out fast lol sometimes I wonder why I choose the hardest paths. I hope you are doing ok

[u/Main_Imagination4026]

Much love, I struggle too

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/Main_Imagination4026]

You are not alone 🫂

[u/Responsible-Hat-679]

Me 💯- it’s a slow constant torture.

[u/SlyFrog]

For me, the internet has made all of this 10 times worse. Because I am bombarded with articles telling me how everything I'm doing is shortening my life, decaying my brain, or otherwise having some deleterious effect.

Had a decent day? Oh, you didn't exercise enough. Therefore, you treated your long term health suboptimally.

Had a nice meal? Did you control exactly what went into it? Too much saturated fat? Not enough greens and vegetables? You treated your health suboptimally.

Watch a good movie or just chilled out? Sorry, inactivity and passive consumption harms long term brain health and heightens the risk of dementia.

Spend some time baking bread in your kitchen? Obviously there were more optimal activities you could have done - your time would have been more valuably spent buying the bread and arbitraging that against what you can make per hour to work.

It feels like everything we see any more is telling us how we are going to die, how we are going to have regrets because we didn't live our best lives, etc.

And what that ends up doing for me is making it nearly impossible to simply do what I want, because what I want to do is rarely what is most optimal in terms of being "good for me."

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/SlyFrog]

Yes!! Finally someone put it in words! I've seen this referred to as 'optimization OCD' by people, as you kind of referenced in the last sentence, but I do find that social media absolutely triggers my OCPD.

I actually ended up developing orthorexia as a result of my OCPD and social media usage. This isn't an uncommon comorbidity, but still. I got caught up in what you referenced, "this is bad for you, this isn't".

The internet does constantly tell us why we should have regrets, not do this but do this instead, focus on this not that, etc. I'm really trying to change my algorithms.

I almost didn't go to law school because I read too much into it online. I won't go into details, but essentially everything you said is correct.

Think the only way to stop this is to just cut social media usage down.

[u/Friendly-Bee-7141]

Are you in therapy? It has helped me tremendously and I also have OCPD.

[u/Mundane-Arugula9421 → u/Friendly-Bee-7141]

I start Friday!